President Biden and leading Democratic lawmakers on Sunday condemned a protest against Israeli property sales at a Los Angeles synagogue as anti-Semitic.
Groups protesting the Israel-Hamas war and U.S. policies toward Israel gathered outside Adas Torah, the synagogue where organizers held the event. Real estate sales ads “A housing project in Israel’s premier British neighborhood”
“Threatening Jewish people is dangerous, reprehensible, anti-Semitic and un-American,” Biden said in a statement. Posted to social media on Monday“Americans have the right to peaceful protest, but disrupting access to places of worship and engaging in violence is never acceptable.”
Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass (Democrat) and California Governor Gavin Newsom (Democrat) also condemned the protests.
In a statement on Monday, the protest group Code Pink slammed Biden’s comments as a “lie.”
“It is outrageous that President Biden and some media outlets have misrepresented this protest as an anti-Semitic attack on worshippers,” the group said in a statement, making clear that the protest was over a property sale and had nothing to do with the synagogue itself.
“This rhetoric is reminiscent of McCarthy-era smears used to discredit and sometimes expel peace and civil rights activists,” the paper continued. “His story is not only false but also dangerous. The protests are aimed at addressing the unethical sale of Palestinian land and are not targeting any particular religious group.”
It is unclear whether the property in the case includes disputed property in the West Bank, which would be illegal under international law.
The protest group also said Biden’s comments were fanning the flames of Islamophobia, pointing to an incident in Texas last month in which a man tried to paint a picture of a 3-year-old Palestinian-American girl. The group criticized Biden for not making a public statement about the crime even after the woman was arrested. Charged with murder on sunday.
Just hours after Code Pink’s statement, Blaming Biden Texas attack.
The conflict over the protests comes amid growing dissatisfaction with President Biden’s handling of the Israeli-Hamas war, which has caused divisions within the Democratic Party as the Israeli government appears unwilling to accept Biden-led ceasefire agreements.
